In England, a hunting man, in deference to the thermometer and for the love of his clothes, usually avoids forcing his horse to swim. In a warm climate, however, the operation is attended with no danger or inconvenience whatever. In riding gradually into deep water the animal, just before he floats, appears to step rather uneasily, as if on legs of different lengths; but the instant his feet take leave of the ground, or if at once he plunges out of his depth from a bank, as soon as his head comes up he proceeds as free from jolts of any sort as a balloon in the air, grunting and groaning, nevertheless, heavily, at the injustice of having a man's weight superadded to his own, the specific gravity of which but little exceeds that of the element into which he is striving not to sink. Instinctively, however, adjusting himself to the most favourable position, which throws the hind part of his body about a foot under water, he makes the best of a bad bargain, and then all the rider has to do is not to destroy the poor animal's equilibrium by pulling even an ounce at his bridle. Indeed, in crossing a broad stream, the most effectual way to prevent over-balancing him, and also to stop his grunting, is either to slip sideways from his back, and then, half-swimming, to be dragged alongside him by a lock of his mane firmly entwined among the fingers of the right hand, or, as is invariably practised by the red Indians, to be towed by his tail, in which case the man floating on the surface of the water is quite safe from the heels of the horse struggling many feet below him. By this plan, of course, the water, instead of the horse, sustains the weight of the man.
In a closely-enclosed country, with slow hounds, a cold scent, and a fat huntsman, a good jumping nag is what is mainly required. But to follow fleet hounds across large grass fields, however excellent may be a horse's jumping, however clever at doubles, safe at timber, bold at water; and though to all of these accomplishments be added every qualification of hand, heel, head, and heart, which an experienced rider can possibly possess, "the tottle of the whole" must inevitably amount to "disappointment," unless the animal be able to maintain the requisite pace. And yet in a run it does not at all follow that the leading horse is the fastest, that the hindmost is the slowest, that a heaving flank is an indication of impaired lungs, or a still one of good wind. On the contrary, it is often but too true that the first ought to have been the last, and the last the first; so much depends on the manner in which the different horses have been ridden.